


A Real Good Lady

by missparker



Category: Murphy Brown (TV)
Genre: Friendship, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-09-30
Updated: 2008-09-30
Packaged: 2017-10-18 18:39:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 633
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/192007
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/missparker/pseuds/missparker
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Eldin makes coffee in the morning and leaves her a cup on the counter.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Real Good Lady

Eldin is there when she goes to sleep and is there when she gets up in the morning and it takes her the better part of a year to figure out that it's because he never leaves. She's an excellent reporter when it comes to the world but her observational skills sometimes fail to penetrate her brownstone.

Eldin makes coffee in the morning and leaves her a cup on the counter.

When she leaves for work he's already elbow deep in blue paint and when she comes home, he's standing in her kitchen washing out his brushes.

It takes her at least two years to realize that it's the best relationship she has ever had.

Sometimes, when she pops home in the middle of the day, she finds him asleep on the couch. She takes off her shoes so the sound of her heels against the hardwood doesn't disturb him.

She has a guest room with it's own bath but when she checks on the room every once in a while, it never looks disturbed. She's going to have to spell it out for him. At Christmas, she gets him monogrammed towels and hangs them pointedly in the guest bathroom. She finds the hand towel a week later, stained with orange paint.

On President's day weekend, she comes home from Germany to find him working on the ceiling in her laundry room.

"I've been awake for three days," he says, swaying dangerously on his step ladder.

"Me too," she says. "Let's go to bed."

He follows her up the stairs and when she opens the door to the guest room, he shuts the door behind him and they both sleep through the night into the late afternoon and then eat pancakes for dinner.

Occasionally, he goes home. Or at least he says he does. In the rare moments he isn't in her house, she misses him. Not like how she misses the '60s or the month and a half she spent crank calling Diane Sawyer at 1:00 in the morning every day or that meatball sandwich that Phil discontinued last year. She misses him acutely and achingly. She feels like she's lost a limb and there is a pain in the space it used to reside.

Every couple of months, he claims to be finished and every couple a months, he finds a reason to stay.

When she thinks about her life in terms of the future, nothing is very clear. Will she still be at FYI in twenty years? Will she ever share a news desk with an anchor who isn't Jim Dial? Will she stay in Washington, will she marry? It's all so hazy and subject to change. But when she thinks about Eldin, she can see him so clearly. Holding a paintbrush, wiping his hands on his soiled overalls. His leather jacket on the coat rack by her door - his truck parked on the street, his tomato juice in her refrigerator.

Will there be a time when she doesn't want him in her house? Of course not. She will always want Eldin.

She comes home from work in a foul mood but when she opens the door, Eldin is there with a takeout container filled with Chinese food and two sets of chopsticks.

"I love you," she says, sinking on the sofa next to you. "I really do."

She can see that he considers a witty comeback but the look on her face is so genuine that he smiles a little. His eyes crinkle at the corners and he nudges her with his elbow.

"I love you," he says. "You're a real good lady."

When he leans over to pick out a piece of shrimp from her container, she doesn't even try to stab her chopsticks into his hand.


End file.
